Sunday of the tournament had me play Bo Patterson with... Lizardmen!
Having been 12-8 then 8-12 against these scaley frog followers had me eager to tip the scales in my favour and establish a hold on Vampire Coast(if only this was a campaign).
Bo had his Slaan deployed in a large unit of Temple Guard with all the trimmings including that wonderful Becalming effect on my Necro. Other than that he had a couple units of Saurus warriors along with the (as I was learning) compulsory chameleon skinks, salamanders and skink skirmishers. He did however have an Engine of the Gods with a wee skink priest atop it. The battle was Blood and Glory and all Bo had to do for the 600vp was score 1 banner, when theyre carried by Zombies it shouldn't be much of a challenge. Now I could have held the 2 Zombie units back but that would exposed the flank of my Ghoul/Vampire unit.
Wolves and Bats headed off to the left flank to intercept his chaff while the main blocks moved centrally. We exchanged slight blows in the first couple turns with Bo focusing his salamanders on my zombies and my Banshees retaliating by draining wounds from his various small units. Things were leading up to a big grind in the middle when an early Miscast of Throne of Vines by the Slaan saw him nuke 9 Temple Guard and take a wound of itself! It was the 5th? fail of a 2+ save vs miscast Bo had had too. In my turn I took advantage and in went the Crypt Horrors and Ghoul King lead unit full force with some augments to boot. Down went all the Temnple guard and a fleeing Slaan got trampled by Crypt Horrors while the Ghoul block reformed to face the rest of the Lizards. Bo raced his Stegadon through the lines and took out the battered zombie unit taking the break points vps. The rest of the game saw some brutal combats as my Vampire and co slew the Stegadon, my wolves and Fell bats actually won some combats and chased their prey off the board and a couple banshees did clean up duty on some stray small units. In the end Bo only had an unscathed unit of Saurus left and I scored 17-3. If I had protected my Zombies better it would have been mor,e but increasing the break point will be something to take into consideration in future builds.
Last game was against Peter Williamson's MSU Bretonnians with a nice straight forward punch up.
We had an entertaining deployment with Peter pleading with me to deploy a 'real' unit other than all my crap, seems to be a bonus for the vampires at the moment. Peter himself had an impressive number of units with multiple Knights as well as Yeoman, Peasants and Pegasus knights. Peter analysed some distances and had his units well back from Banshee threat in the early moves while my main units moved toward him navigating their way around some central terrain, I moved the Crypt Horrors across in front of my ghoul block to hold vs Knight charges then the action started. Peter charged the Crypt Horrors with 3 units of Knights including one with a hero wielding a flaming sword - oh crap! That unit itself had the most awkward charge and while silently hoping for a fail Peter made the roll and in came the flaming stick of doom. The hero rolled his attacks and only struck once! but alas he did wound and there went the 4+ regen >( following a barrage of lance strikes the Crypt Horrors crumbled for the first time and the knights rolled on inot the ghouls. From there it was a full 6 turn game of grind. A flank charge had him plow through the Mortis engine and got a 4th unit in the fight and with many many armour saves being made by Peter he finally crumbled my generals unit in the last turn. 0-20 and a well deserved win to Peter. I may have had my arse kicked but what a long brutal slog it was.
In the end I am happy to report I placed 12 of 30 and find this an improvement over previous scores. The Scream list along with some others were mentioned by Raymond at the closing when he announced his favourite list. I didn't go all the way and should have had Skabscrath on my Lord, fair enough I say.
Pete Dunn undefeated came 1st, Peter Williamson came 2nd(I dont feel so bad) and Hagen Kerr came 3rd. John Murrie got Best Sportsmen and Sam Whitt had Best painted with his striking Chaos Dwarves. Congratulations to you all.
So thank you to Raymond for the amazing organisation he had, score form and army list together on one sheet and prompt round draws, also I enjoyed his comments while he watched parts of many of the games I played - all about skill right? and roll those dice...
Thank you to Pete Dunn for getting us all together for it and of course the fantastic scenery.
Cheers to all my opponents, probably the most enjoyable set of games I have ever had at a tournament - must be why we all got max sports.
and of course thanks for the ride home John.
I have a much better appreciation for Lizardmen now and have studied the book during week. I would recommend it to new players for sure and might get a couple models to paint myself. I also have a couple changes to make in my list and will post those soon.
Thanks Glen, the reports were well worth the read, thanks for taking the time to put them up. How did the Ghoul King go this time round; I know you mention him, but in particular how did you find his performance?
ReplyDeleteAnd how did many of your opponents handle the Banshees (or not....)?
It's funny, between Fields of Blood, Plastic Krak, Stumpy Heaven and here it's certainly been a well covered event. There's two other blogs who might also write it up as well.
Cheers.
Cheers for the feedback Tane.
ReplyDeleteThe Ghoul King was a rock star as usual. Rank and file died in droves against his 7 attacks plus Red Fury but I have decided to go back to the Ogre Blade for +2 Strength. It would have made a big difference vs Peter in the last game with punching through those good armour saves. It will pay off against other heavy cav, monsters and chaos warriors. The only game he died in I think was the last one.
The Banshees are a mixed bag, very hit or miss. Combined with the -1 Ld from Aura of Dark Majesty makes a little difference but a low roll means they don't do squat. However they did excell at clearing chaff and redirectors with skinks and salamanders being on the menu. I will always keep a couple in the list but with the points I save from 2 and a couple other cuts I will be adding a Terrorgheist asap, bigger scream you see ;)